This paper comes up with the seemingly simple and innocuous result that rosacea sufferers are more likely to fill prescription repeats for oral treatments compared to topicals.

This lead to the suggestion by Collagenex that sufferers are generally more satisfied with the effects of oral treatments.

In recent press release they further suggested that this was a reason that the market for Oracea was large and likely to just keep growing. Apart from the financial implications of this paper, I can’t think of much else of interest to sufferers. Can you ?

Poster Session P108, Management of rosacea in the United States: Analysis based on recent prescribing patterns and insurance claims, James Del Rosso, DO, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV, United States

Rosacea is a commonly encountered skin disorder in dermatology practice, affecting approximately 14 million people in the United States, or 1 in 20 Americans, based on data from the National Rosacea Society.

Unfortunately, little data exists of prescribing patterns and utilization of therapies by patients with rosacea. Data collected from a recognized physician-panel, prescribing database, such as the IMS National Disease and Therapeutic Index, suggests that approximately 10% of individuals affected by rosacea seek conventional medical treatment, with 76% of patient visits going to dermatologists.

What does current drug utilization data suggest regarding the current standards of care about rosacea therapy and the actual use of recommended therapies by patients?

On average, patients visit a physician office twice per year and their physicians prescribe 1.3 drugs per visit. Approximately three-fourths (76.7%) of drugs utilized by patients were topical agents with systemic therapies, primarily oral tetracycline derivatives, comprising 23.3% of the total, however, data collected from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey indicates that combination regimens are more widely used by dermatologists. The utilization rate for topical and oral treatments were 1.7 and 2.2 Rx/year/per treated rosacea patient, respectively.

Important factors identified by prescribing and utilization patterns were the suggestion that overall refills were more likely to be obtained with oral therapy as compared to topical therapy.

The analysis identified 122,964 patients with a primary or secondary diagnosis of rosacea (ICD-9-CM 695.3) from an overall population of 9,151,174 enrollees, ages 30 and older, irrespective of length of enrollment.

100% of poster production sponsored by CollaGenex Corporation.

Are you Happier with Oracea?

So the obvious question is, are you happier with Oracea than say Finacea or Metrogel?